Dixon’s has win in legal battle

SANTA FE — In a win for the long-time operators of the famous Dixon’s Apple Orchard, a hearing officer ruled Monday that state Land Commissioner Ray Powell shouldn’t have rejected assignment of the orchard lease to San Felipe Pueblo last year.

Former District Judge James A. Hall, serving as hearing officer for the orchard operators’ appeal of Powell’s denial of the lease deal, found that the land commissioner’s decision-making process was “not rational and is arbitrary and capricious as a matter of law.”

San Felipe Pueblo had agreed to pay $2.8 million to Becky and Jim Mullane of Dixon’s for assignment of their lease on the orchard and another 8,600 acres of adjacent state trust land. The Mullanes decided to leave Dixon’s, located in a picturesque canyon near Cochiti, after it was ruined by wildfire and floods in 2011.

“We’re very pleased that after a full vetting of the facts, really at the end of the story justice has been done,” said Tom Hnasko, lawyer for the Mullanes. “These people have gone through an emotional, physical and financial whirlwind and this will give them hope they can put their lives back together.”

Powell, who can accept or reject Hall’s findings, said he will assess Hall’s report and “try to be as fair and responsible as I can be and fulfill my role to take of care of the beneficiaries (of state trust land revenue) and taxpayers.”

Trust land dollars go for several purposes, including schools and hospitals. Powell has maintained the Mullanes’ lease, negotiated under former Land Commissioner Patrick Lyons, is a bad deal for the state and shouldn’t be extended by assigning it to San Felipe.

What happens to the orchard next is unclear. If Powell once again denies the lease assignment, the Mullanes can appeal to state district court.

And whether San Felipe Pueblo still wants to pay $2.8 million for the 75-year lease — the deal it struck with the Mullanes last year — is also an unknown.
— This article appeared on page C1 of the Albuquerque Journal